By Casey Mullaney
•
July 8, 2025
Dear members and friends of the Dorothy Day Guild, Greetings on what for many of us in North America is already shaping up to be another hot, sticky summer day! We hope that those of you in hot climates are staying cool and are finding creative ways to support those in your towns and cities who are unsheltered from the elements. Emma, a member of our Catholic Worker community in South Bend, washes out empty milk jugs, fills them halfway with clean water, and freezes them overnight. In the morning, she fills them the rest of the way and hands them out to guests at our drop-in center to help them stay cool and hydrated throughout the afternoon. If you regularly walk or drive past homeless community members on your commute, we encourage you to pack an extra sealed bottle of water to give away on days like this. Here in the United States, we just celebrated the Fourth of July, a holiday which admittedly doesn’t mean very much to many of those who admire Dorothy and seek to follow Christ as she did. Dorothy practiced a very different kind of revolution than the kind which is celebrated by military parades and fireworks displays. In 1940, she wrote , “we consider the spiritual and corporal Works of Mercy and the following of Christ to be the best revolutionary technique and a means of changing the social order rather than perpetuating it. Did not the thousands of monasteries, with their hospitality change the entire social pattern of their day?” To all those who undertake the responsibility of sheltering the homeless, giving drink to the thirsty, and all works of mercy in the heat, thank you for these revolutionary acts! Summer events: Our Guild’s online and in-person summer programming is in full swing as of this week! As a reminder, we are running TWO book clubs this summer, one in English and one in Spanish. Our English-language club is reading The Long Loneliness and has already had two meetings, but it’s not too late to sign up!
